Tag Archives: selflove

What is Love? Baby Don’t Hurt Me

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Valentine’s Day is tomorrow!!!
I love Valentine’s Day!
I love the spirit, I love the colors, I just love all the love that is in the air.

cartoon character sitting with dreamy face with hearts around her

Image By: We Heart It

We show love all year but itā€™s so different around Valentine’s day, because itā€™s basically love on steroids lol. Itā€™s the extra that feels good: the frosting on the cake, the whipped cream on top of the frappucino, the sprinkles on the ice cream. It just feels better than all the other days and it looks prettier. Hey, maybe itā€™s just me, but I love it.

Valentineā€™s day isn’t just about a romantic relationship. Itā€™s about showing love to someone in your life, whether itā€™s a romantic partner, a best friend, your parents, other family members, or even your pet. Itā€™s about putting that love out there to make their world shine even brighter for the day.

In ode to Valentineā€™s day I asked friends and family to answer one of two questions:

  1. How did you know you were in love?
    or
  2. What does love mean to you?

Their responses reminded me why the essence of Valentine’s day is so important.
Their answers were:

ā€œI knew I was in love when I started crying because she hung up on meā€ LOL
– Adonijah

ā€œLove is more than just a feeling. You can feel strongly in like but love requires commitment. You can like someone and not be committed to them but love is a bond that yearns commitment.ā€
– Justin B

ā€œYour smile melted my heart and I just knew 27 years agoā€
– My Corny Older Sister Afiya

ā€œI knew I was in love when I cared about his feelings and thought of how he would react to certain situations before I thought of anyone elseā€
– Lexxii

ā€œThe minute you find out you’re pregnant and then you hear the heartbeat, that is a love no one can match. I loved my daughter from that moment. I knew my purpose in life now was to love her, protect her, and make sure she knows I love her so she can accept nothing less from anyone elseā€
– Mareena

ā€œI have no idea what love is. Sometimes I think Iā€™m in love after one hour but should it be that fast? I donā€™t have a real solid definition but I know it feels damn goodā€
-Sabreen

ā€œLove is so splendid. Itā€™s selfless, kind, gentle, understanding, considerate. Love is putting yourself in situations to see how it feels to someone else before you do it. Love is wanting to be near the person or thing that gives you butterflies all the time. Love just might be the most powerful feeling.ā€
– My Mom whom I love every day by the way šŸ™‚ lol

ā€œLove means that you care for somebody and that somebody loves you and you love them.ā€
– My six-year-old niece (She’s onto something here)

Valentineā€™s day doesnā€™t have to be just about showering someone with gifts, or spending a lot of money, orā€”like some Valentine’s day haters would sayā€”ā€œtaking this ONE day to show people you love them.”Ā I can understand though how the commercialism of Valentine’s day can leave a bad taste in people’s mouthsā€”it seems like just another day to put ridiculous amounts of money into businesses’ and restaurants’ pockets. Not to mention how triggering it can be for single people or people whose relationship isn’t in the best place. That’s why any time I come across someone that has this opinion about Valentine’s day, I like to emphasize that personally, my best version of Valentine’s Day usually requires no money to be spent at all, and it’s not just about a boyfriend or girlfriend. I enjoy quality time with family and people I love, letters, handmade thoughtful gifts and memorabilia. You can celebrate and have your special day that way as well, full of sentiment and without the need of material things.

Valentineā€™s day is a day of reflection, really remembering why you love who you love, why you appreciate them, and dedicating the day as the anniversary, the holiday, the celebration for that love. How can you not love it?!

boy with glasses with dreamy eyes looking up

Retrieved from QuanJing

For those of you who have a love-hate relationship with Valentine’s day, be your own Valentine this year. Shower yourself with love and attention.

man pointing to you as viewer with words "treat yourself"

Gif Retrieved from Pajiba.com

Whatever your reasoning may be for not necessarily enjoying or desiring to celebrate Valentine’s day, recreate the day and dedicate it to yourself. Iā€™m always here for the self love, honey. Self love is the best love. The more you love yourself is the more you love others and accept love and disregard hate. But make sure you get a slice of all this love that is flying around right now; it’s beautiful, and on Feb 15th you wonā€™t see it this loud anymore lol šŸ™‚

happy valentines day

Image from Pixabay

two young girls hugging and smiling

Image by Masterfile

man and woman sitting on couch smiling at each other

Retrieved from Essence.com

two women in intimate hug embrace

Retrieved from CinemaJam

two male hands interlocked

Retrieved from StarObserver

toddler girl kissing her reflection in the mirror

Retrieved from PathwaysOfWisdom

The Finish Line

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Good Morning!!! Today marks several finish lines for me.
(1) Itā€™s the official last day of my semester,
(2) it also marks the beautiful finish to my first successful semester with The Buzz Blog!
When I first started, I had no idea where to really begin and how to organize my thoughts into things that would make sense to you guys reading it.
You can kind of compare the way my creative brain works to that last minute of popcorn popping in the microwave. You think itā€™s done and then there’s that solo *POP* out of nowhere and youā€™re like “Oh! I guess itā€™s not done” lol. Thatā€™s how my ideas work, I think Iā€™m all settled and decided and then Iā€™m like “Oh wait what about this instead?! Let’s change the whole thing and start over”.

Throughout this process of improving and growing, I have learned so much about channeling the message, and even when it feels like it is about to gear off a bit, finding a way to make the underlyingĀ message clear. I hope that you have taken away whatever message was meant for you, in that moment, while reading my posts. Namaste!

So last week I told you guys to keep pushing for your goals (Be a GOALDigger!), and to keep striving for the things that help you define success and happiness in your lives. Thereā€™s no greater feeling than living your best life, or at least knowing youā€™re on your way there. In my group dynamics class, which focuses on leading groups: from support groups, educational groups, self- help groups, etc, I was asked to create an icebreaker that promotes and challenges self actualization. I want to share the icebreaker with you because all of the things that I’ve talked about in this blog this semester from self love, to self care, to self discovery, they all really focus on how much you know about you, and how in tune you are with yourself and your feelings.

The icebreaker is named The ā€œI Know Meā€ Checklist and itā€™s actually not a checklist, but a sentence completion exercise (Don’t ask..a checklist is going down a list so it works). It is 12 sentences meant to be answered in the morning, or maybe at the beginning of your week to take time to do some self reflection, encourage yourself, and also goal setting. Positive self talk is one of the driving factors of happiness and well being. As human beings weā€™re constantly talking to ourselves whether it’s actually outloud, or the things we are thinking internally, and this dialogue directly affects our confidence and self-esteem.
So why not make it as positive as it can be??

list of sentence completion activity

Credit: Neffi

When you get the chance, check out the ā€œchecklistā€ and go through it yourself now if you can, completing the sentences with the first (positive) response that comes to mind.
Or save it for tonight before bed, whenever you can be clear to enter a free cognitive space. Reflect on the thoughts and feelings it brings to light.
How does the answers make you feel? Think differently?

Please feel free to go through this checklist or even create your own to use as motivation and a reality check for you. Maybe you have a moment where you just need to feel better about yourself. Maybe you need to realign and figure out what your next steps are and what your goals are. Maybe you just need to create a mantra and routine. Exercises like these are beneficial to your relationship with YOU.
There’s no one on earth we spend more time with than ourselves.
I don’t know about you but I need that relationship to be A1!
Like the quote in the picture says:
ā€œA negative mind cannot produce a positive life. Speak your happiness into existence!ā€


Happy holidays and Happy winter break to you all!
With Lotsssss of Loveeeeee,
maybe too much love,
like overwhelming “Grandma get off my cheeks I’m grown now” love,

Neffi!

Photo Credits:
Left Photo
Middle Photo
Right Photo